**Detail of the Locarno kiosk: it stood at various locations throughout the city for around 100 years and is now part of the Swiss National Museum’s collection.** Swiss National Museum

A kiosk that moved with the times

The Locarno kiosk was much more than a small booth for the display and sale of goods. At various times throughout its almost 100-year history it was a newspaper kiosk, an information point for tourists seeking adventure and an internet café. All of which makes it a witness to economic and social change in all its facets.

Aaron Estermann

Aaron Estermann studied history, media studies and visual communication, and is curator for historical photography at the Swiss National Museum.

Throughout its history, the retail trade has tended to favour size. When industrialisation made it possible to mass-produce goods, a large number of new, innovative retail spaces and ways of selling began to emerge from the mid-19th century. Examples include department stores, supermarkets, shopping centres and, most recently, online shopping, all of which try to win over customers by offering the largest possible selection of products at the lowest possible prices. Nevertheless, small sales venues were still able to carve out a space for themselves in the increasingly crowded market around 1900. They tend to be somewhat overlooked by historians, even though their importance as part of people’s daily lives should not be underestimated. The kiosk is a perfect example. Architectonically speaking, the first kiosks were lightweight structures made of wood or iron and glass. As free-standing pieces of street furniture, they could be erected quickly on walkways, on squares or in parks. And they could be moved or removed just as quickly. It was due in no small part to this mobile, transitory quality that a fully preserved kiosk from Locarno found its way into the collection of the Swiss National Museum in 2011. It is difficult to pin down exactly when the kiosk began trading in Locarno. A photo on a postcard dating from around 1910 shows it next to the Hotel Bahnhof and opposite the funicular that linked the town centre with the pilgrimage church of Madonna del Sasso from 1906. Typically for a kiosk, it therefore stood in a spot where a lot of passing trade could be expected, and in this case that included tourists. The sign in German and the goods on display show that the kiosk sold newspapers and other print material. This made it part of a burgeoning market for information, in which mass media both drummed up and pandered to the clientele’s growing interest in the latest news and entertainment.

**The kiosk pictured opposite the lower terminus of the Locarno–Madonna del Sasso funicular around 1910.** Swiss National Museum
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**The kiosk in Viale Francesco Balli following its first move, 1926.** Archivio di Stato del Cantone Ticino
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**An urban oasis: wedged between car park and restaurant terrace, the kiosk radiated the lightness of summer circa 1970.** Swiss National Museum
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By 1926, the kiosk had moved to a new location for the first time. A photograph from that year shows it situated 60 metres to the southeast on Viale Francesco Balli, and thus slightly closer to Lake Maggiore. It is likely that the kiosk had to vacate its former site to make way for the ‘Palazzo Funicolare’, the representative new head office of the company that operated the funicular. The kiosk was run by Italian-born Teresa Cacciamognaga for many decades. Her great nephew Giancarlo Cacciamognaga recalls that it stayed open all year round, apart from Christmas. Teresa’s son Rolando helped out and began managing the business in his own right following her death in 1963, if not earlier. He ran the kiosk together with his Polish-born wife Mary until the mid-1990s. Giancarlo Cacciamognaga further recollects the typical assortment of goods that make any kiosk a place often associated with nostalgic memories of small moments of happiness and guilty pleasures. As well as newspapers, magazines and postcards, the kiosk stocked tobacco products like cigarettes and cigars. And, of course, sweets were also available. Chocolate and ice cream were particularly popular with Italian customers who came on boat trips to Locarno at weekends. And not forgetting the Swiss and Italian Sport-Toto, a form of modest betting that generated regular repeat custom. Because part of the thrill when placing their crosses on the coupon each time was not knowing whether they would soon be able to celebrate a big win.

**The kiosk as a ‘visitor centre’ and ‘cyberbox’, 2005.** Ralph Heksch

The kiosk generated thrills and endorphin kicks of a different kind in its final decade. Armino Kistler took over the business in 1998. In addition to the items traditionally stocked by any kiosk, he began selling the activities on offer at his sailing school. By joining forces with the organisers of other outdoor sports such as canyoning, river rafting, bungee jumping, climbing and paragliding, he turned the kiosk into a self-styled visitor centre. Kistler drew attention to the adventurous pastimes using colourful, hand-painted advertising signs that he affixed to the roof and outer surfaces of the kiosk or propped against nearby trees. It is these, together with the neon signs and stickers promoting well-known brands such as Swisslos (the Swiss national lottery), Coca-Cola and the Swiss Tourist Board that create the characteristic look, evoking spontaneity, summer and a zest for life, that we still associate with the kiosk today.

**A door to the world: at the start of the new millennium, newspapers and magazines gave way to computers with internet access, 2005.** Mo Peerbacus / Alamy Stock Photo

The kiosk even had its own website – including animations on the home page, 2007. Internet Archive

The final addition to the goods and services on offer was also the subject of prominent advertising. In 2003, Armino Kistler installed four computers with internet access at the kiosk. In the era before the great smartphone revolution, this open-air internet ‘café’ enabled people to connect to the World Wide Web when away from home. Ten minutes of surfing, chatting or sending emails cost CHF 2, or you could spend a whole hour on the internet for CHF 9. The kiosk became a much-used ‘door to the world’, with people queuing up, especially during the international Locarno Film Festival.

**Postcards that were available at the kiosk until it closed.** Swiss National Museum / © Foto Video Garbani, Locarno

Armino Kistler wanted to hand the kiosk over to a successor in 2008. But the local authorities in Locarno decided not to renew the lease. As they planned to create two parking spaces on the spot where the kiosk stood, they instructed Kistler to remove the structure and to return the site to its original condition. Aware of the kiosk’s long history, Kistler lodged an appeal with the cantonal authorities. At the same time, he informed the media about what was happening and, in a further act of protest, put the actual booth up for sale on eBay. Several newspapers in Ticino and German-speaking Switzerland covered the story. As a result, the kiosk did in fact find a buyer on the online auction platform: Basel-based curator and artist Klaus Littmann. Littmann was interested in the kiosk as a reflection of everyday culture and originally thought about including it in an artistic project, displayed as a ‘readymade’. However, when this no longer seemed possible following its removal from Locarno, Littmann presented the kiosk to the Swiss National Museum in 2011 in recognition of its cultural-historical value.

**The kiosk was painstakingly restored in 2024 before going on display in the ‘Consumer Worlds. Focusing on everyday life’ exhibition.** Swiss National Museum

‘Consumer worlds. Focusing on everyday life’ opened at the National Museum Zurich on 20 December 2024. The kiosk is a centrepiece of the exhibition. It is not shown as a ‘readymade’, but as a multi-layered exhibit symbolising the ability of retail locations to adapt and innovate as well as the shift in our media, consumer and experience-based needs in everyday life and when on holiday.

More of: 20th / 21st century Economy Tourism Culture World of museums Collection

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